Russiaâ€™s Stealth Fighter Could Match U.S. Jets, Analyst Says

Russiaâ€™s T-50 stealth fighter prototype, the first radar-evading warplane outside the U.S. when it debuted in January 2010, is slightly less stealthy than the American F-22 and about equal to the smaller F-35. But in several other respects the new warplane from the Russian Sukhoi design bureau is actually superior to the American models.

Thatâ€™s the surprising conclusion of the first-ever public scientific analysis of the T-50â€²s Radar Cross-Section (RCS), completed this week by Dr. Carlo Kopp, an analyst with the independent think tank Air Power Australia.

â€œThe shaping of the T-50 is inferior to that of the F-22 Raptor,â€ Kopp writes in his dense, jargon-heavy report. But the F-35 and T-50, he adds, exhibit â€œsimilar â€¦ RCS behavior.â€

But Koppâ€™s assessment of the T-50 comes with caveats. Quite a few of them, actually. To match the stealthiness of the Lockheed Martin F-35 â€” to say nothing of the companyâ€™s F-22 â€” Sukhoiâ€™s engineers will have to, among other changes, modify the T-50â€²s engines to a less obtrusive fitting and add a layer of radar-absorbing material to the planeâ€™s skin.

With the revised engines and skin, the T-50â€²s â€œspecular RCS performance will satisfy the Very Low Observable (VLO) requirement that strong specular returns are absent in the nose sector angular domain,â€ Kopp writes. Translated into plain English, Koppâ€™s saying that an optimized version of the Russian jet could be very, very difficult to detect by most radars as itâ€™s bearing down on them.

Major refinements are standard practice as stealth prototypes go through development, itâ€™s worth noting. The F-22 and the F-35 underwent big design changes as each was developed over 15 years or more. The T-50, only four of which have been built, has been flying for just under three years and isnâ€™t scheduled to enter frontline service until 2016 at the earliest. Thereâ€™s time for the Russians to finesse the design, just as the Chinese are doing with their stealth planes.

Granted, by 2016 the Americans could possess hundreds of combat-ready F-35s plus the roughly 180 F-22s already in service. The T-50 could make up for its lateness with impressive performance that in some ways exceeds even the F-22â€²s vaunted capabilities.

One Russian advantage is what Kopp calls â€œextreme plus agilityâ€ â€” a consequence of the T-50â€²s â€œadvanced aerodynamic design, exceptional thrust/weight ratio performance and three dimensional thrust vectoring integrated with an advanced digital flight control system.â€

The second advantage: â€œexceptional combat persistence, the result of an unusually large 25,000-pound internal fuel load,â€ Kopp writes. The T-50 could keep flying and fighting long after the F-22 and F-35 have run out of gas.

Moreover, the T-50 will dodge certain radars better than others, according to Kopp â€” and U.S. sensors are among the worst at detecting the T-50â€²s unique shape, he contends. Koppâ€™s breakdown of T-50 RCS by radar type shows Chinese â€œcounter-VLO radars,â€ specifically designed to spot American stealth planes, detecting the T-50 best.

The next best sensors to use against the Russian fighter is the UHF radar aboard the U.S. Navyâ€™s E-2 early-warning planes. American fighter radars, including those aboard the F-22 and F-35, are of middling effectiveness against the T-50, Kopp asserts.

â€œNo fundamental obstacles exist in the shaping design of the T-50 prototype which might preclude its development into a genuine Very Low Observable design,â€ Kopp concludes.

In other words: Watch out, America! Youâ€™re now only one of three countries with a truly radar-evading warplane in the air.

Air Power Australia.is a joke. Remember this is other countries first version of stealth fighters , The F22 and F35 are the USA 6th and 7th operations stealth aircraft, the result of 40 years of manfacturing stealth planes. True stealth planes are not something one with the technology of Russia can build right out of the starting gate.

Russiaâ€™s T-50 stealth fighter prototype, the first radar-evading warplane outside the U.S. when it debuted in January 2010, is slightly less stealthy than the American F-22 and about equal to the smaller F-35.

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Stealth aircraft do not "evade" radar. They avoid detection.

Stealth aircraft are aircraft that use stealth technology[1] to avoid detection by employing a combination of features to interfere with radar as well as reduce visibility in the infrared,[2] visual, audio, and radio frequency (RF) spectrum.

Average American is obsessed and morbidly nervous of the certain superior features the T50 has. Therefore, his rant is understandable. The American way, after the fall of the Soviet Union, has always been to discredit others through words all the while their armies and machines suffer major reverses at the hands of rag-tag outfits like the Taliban.

If F22/35 is at all a performer or not can only be understood once it is put to active use. The Americans have just kept their fleet 'grounded' while multiple problems keep cropping up, and now through propaganda, they want to hide their failure. Remember, average american, no amount of propaganda will protect your house from being AGM'd by a T50, if the world sees a US-Russia conflict some day. So keep your mind open and sharp.

Can you post the list of 6-7 stealth fighters that have been produced by the US. I googled and found that only stealth planes in production were F117, B2, F22 and now F35. Rest have been cancelled or tech demonstrators only.

Air Power Australia.is a joke. Remember this is other countries first version of stealth fighters , The F22 and F35 are the USA 6th and 7th operations stealth aircraft, the result of 40 years of manfacturing stealth planes. True stealth planes are not something one with the technology of Russia can build right out of the starting gate.

Air Power Australia.is a joke. Remember this is other countries first version of stealth fighters , The F22 and F35 are the USA 6th and 7th operations stealth aircraft, the result of 40 years of manfacturing stealth planes. True stealth planes are not something one with the technology of Russia can build right out of the starting gate.

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.ooohh jeeeez are you kidding?or what?as a matter of fact:russian aircraft designers and industries are recognizes world wide,(specialy: sukhoi is the crown jewel of that)anyone who is try to denied that is just ruining it's own credibility.what is very common ammongs average people.I sure you know what I mean your patriotism should't affect your judgment.

The thing is: the F22 has better RCS than the T-50. So its edge is in BVR combat. But the T-50 like all other members of the Sukhoi family, is extra maneuverable. That means it has a better chance of evading missile(since its RCS is 2nd best) and its an unquestionably the best modern dogfighter. The Australians realise that with the F-35 going haywire, the F22 is the only credible defence against fighters like the T 50 and to a much lesser extent the J-20.

In addition one must consider that this difference in military budgets has been going on since the USSR collapsed almost 20 years ago. Plus the degree of sophistication of the technology is drastically different as well. ie. All tanks are not created equal! (These numbers do not include atomic weapons).
I wont go into such matters as USA expericence in war, Afganstan, Iraq, Gulf, Kuwait. I will point out the USA has been spending 75 billion a year, year after year on military research and development while the Russians spend less then 2 billion.

I keep wondering every time I hear about the Russian military vs the USA from you all is "Are you all out of your minds."

The US accounted for more than 60 percent of global spending on military
r&d of an estimated US $85 bn in 2004. The USA spends tens times that on civilian research from which their is cross over into military applications.

In addition one must consider that this difference in military budgets has been going on since the USSR collapsed almost 20 years ago. Plus the degree of sophistication of the technology is drastically different as well. ie. All tanks are not created equal! (These numbers do not include atomic weapons).
I wont go into such matters as USA expericence in war, Afganstan, Iraq, Gulf, Kuwait. I will point out the USA has been spending 75 billion a year, year after year on military research and development while the Russians spend less then 2 billion.

I keep wondering every time I hear about the Russian military vs the USA from you all is "Are you all out of your minds."

The US accounted for more than 60 percent of global spending on military
r&d of an estimated US $85 bn in 2004. The USA spends tens times that on civilian research from which their is cross over into military applications.

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.Nobody questioned the power of the us armed forces?for example:if I like german chocklet it does not make me a traitor,and the same thing with this jet it it doesn;t make me a communist.I LIKE DEMOCRACY AND THE US.I the one too who cheers up for the US but as a matter of fact.you don,t get the point! Where is your professionalism? this is ridicoulius!!!and you are use your informations unapropietly.fanboy? or PR?this topic should be about avionics enthusiasms.NOT ABOUT PR or LOBBY.you sound more like an advertisment...dude you know the guy who is just try to sell you something...or you know what?if you do... you have to do a much better job of it because it is just annoying.YES FOR FREEDOM NO FOR DUMBNESS.

.Nobody questioned the power of the us armed forces?for example:if I like german chocklet it does not make me a traitor,and the same thing with this jet it it doesn;t make me a communist.I LIKE DEMOCRACY AND THE US.I the one too who cheers up for the US but as a matter of fact.you don,t get the point! Where is your professionalism? this is ridicoulius!!!and you are use your informations unapropietly.fanboy? or PR?this topic should be about avionics enthusiasms.NOT ABOUT PR or LOBBY.you sound more like an advertisment...dude you know the guy who is just try to sell you something...or you know what?if you do... you have to do a much better job of it because it is just annoying.YES FOR FREEDOM NO FOR DUMBNESS.

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I am not an expert on aircraft design, nor do I expect you are or anyone in here really is what I am is an expert on common sense and it defies common sense that a country (Russian) can spend 1/75th what the US spends on research and development for well over 20 years, and with no priort experience in stealth planes compared to a country that has built 5 or 6 generations of stealth planes all of a sudden compete with the USA. F22 and F35, You all keep peeing on my leg and telling me its raining.

What Russia is great at is salemanship or running a con when it comes to India. Its not the first time I wont even mention the migs that would not fly but the INS Vikramaditya is a another good example, 5 billions for a 30 year old rust bucket that even the Russians gave up on because of bad engines.

For more then 25 years the best and brightest of Russian Scientist, those that work in the military field have been leaving for the much better paying job in the west, same as Indians the US technology is the result of the best and brightest mines from all over the world.

^^ You are an expert in propagating falsehoods too, average human. And a sore loser. Ooh! unca Sam isn't getting the juicy contracts like them styoopid Ruskies! Boo hoo, only I Have common sense, rest are common idiots, that's your only point in all your posts.

^^ You are an expert in propagating falsehoods too, average human. And a sore loser. Ooh! unca Sam isn't getting the juicy contracts like them styoopid Ruskies! Boo hoo, only I Have common sense, rest are common idiots, that's your only point in all your posts.

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The Russian military budget for 20 years has been less then20 percent of the USA, its military budget about 1/75 of the USA. those are facts.

Even the Russians agree with me....

Money and motivation are important to any superpower wannabe. So is industrial capability. Security experts doubt that Russia's decayed military-industrial complex can deliver the goods.

They say that without the vast web of small subcontractors that enabled the USSR to produce everything from bullets to intercontinental missiles, the few mainly export-oriented arms industries still working cannot handle the surge of orders that's expected to start pouring from the military's general staff headquarters in Moscow by the end of this year.

"Money is now available, and it may be that a single project like the T-50 is possible, even in Russian circumstances," says Vitaly Shlykov, a former Soviet war planner and ex-deputy defense minister of Russia. "But Russia has de-industrialized. It's basically a third world country that lives by oil extraction today. This rearmament program is a political campaign, to make Putin proud. The T-50 is essentially a political gadget."

Putin is apparently aware of the hurdles. On Oct. 7, he announced that Moscow would spend more than $13 billion over the next three years modernizing more than 1,700 weapons factories. â€œIf we want to have weapons that answer the demands of todayâ€™s combat, ... we need to revamp the military industrial complex,â€ Putin said, according to the Associated Press.

If the T-50 is for real, it's an impressive fighter. Military officials classify is as a "fifth generation" fighter. Thatâ€™s a category of aircraft that only the United States has successfully fielded, in the form of the F-22 Raptor.

Fifth generation fighters have advanced capabilities of stealth, super-maneuverability, sustained supersonic cruise and over-the-horizon radar visibility. They also have integrated weapons and navigation systems managed by artificial intelligence, and high-performance frames made from space-age materials.

Thatâ€™s what it takes to be a real superpower.

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So far, the T-50 has struggled. When one of the two existing prototypes was rolled out for Putin and other officials at Moscow's MAKS airshow in August, 2011, it appeared able to perform only a slow flyby and a few sedate rolls. The next day, when the plane was supposed to be shown to the public, it suffered a flame-out on take off and had to be grounded for the duration of the show.

Some experts are beginning to suspect that the T-50, which is being developed with India as junior partner, may not be all it's cracked up to be.

"Just because they show it publicly doesn't mean we know what's under the hood," says Alexander Golts, a military expert with the online newspaper Yezhednevny Zhurnal.

"We don't even know basic facts about it, such as, does it have new engines or old ones? When we ask questions, they say 'that's top secret,'" he says.

Most of the weapons produced in post-Soviet Russia are at best modified Soviet designs. This is true of it's biggest export cash-earner, the multi-purpose Sukhoi Su-30, sold to India, China and Venezuela, which is a jumped-up version of the Soviet Union's Su-27 front line fighter. The MiG-35, a light fighter Russian arms merchants are offering around the world as a new product, is little changed from the old MiG-29, say experts.

The only truly new designs to appear are the T-50 and the problem-plagued Bulava submarine launched ballistic missile, which is scheduled to go into serial production next year.

In recent years Putin has tried to reclaim the USSR's mojo by merging some of the country's most famous aviation names -- Sukhoi, MiG, Tupolev, Ilyushin -- into a giant state-owned conglomerate known as the United Aircraft-Building Corporation.

But experts say this move only masks the main problem. Fewer than half of Russia's former Soviet military industries are still operating. Virtually none of the old sub-contractors are churning out the multitude of small parts and components that are necessary for assembling a complicated weapons system.

That means every part that goes into a Russian fighter plane these days has to be produced in-house, an exhaustive, time-consuming and exorbitantly expensive process, says Pavel Felgenhauer, a military expert with the opposition Novaya Gazeta newspaper in Moscow.

"Worse than that, there's a huge technological gap between Russian and Western industry," he says.

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"[Russia] still has people who can design new products, but the ability of our industry to produce them is deeply questionable. What can you do if you can't get reliable components, have no modern machinery capable of making precision parts and you lack highly-skilled workers? You can't produce much of value," Felgenhauer says.

Even President Medvedev suggested last summer that the answer might be to buy weapons abroad. Russia already does import a few things, including German sniper rifles and Israeli drones. Last year it signed a controversial contract with France to buy four Mistral-type helicopter assault ships at a price of about $750-million each.

But experts say there is fierce opposition at the top of Russia's military establishment against turning to foreign sources of arms. With the more conservative and nationalistic Putin returning to the presidency next year that option may become politically impossible.

Legendary Russian test pilot, Magomed Tolboyev, says he is one of the T-50's biggest fans, but he doubts the official production startup date of 2013 is realistic.

"We've had 20 years of complete stagnation in our aviation industry; whole plants stopped working, qualified specialists left," he says. "It's an empty space that will take 10 or 15 years to fill. You can't just bring people into a vacant field and tell them to start producing highly delicate and sophisticated machines."

Can you show me anything from any where
that would indicated the the T50 PAK FA is any
thing more then a pimped up SU27.

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You presumptuous fool! Can you show us anything to back your comment? Prove with technical details and not the usual Uncle Sam bluster.
Why do you keep harping on how big your budget is? Do you think your budget makes you invincible? Would you throw wads of cash when a T50 comes calling? You yourself have confessed in a previous post that you are no fighter plane expert. Why do you then foolishly keep trying to write the PakFa off when you've got zero technical acumen and knowhow to do so? For every one article favouring F22 on the net, there's another favouring the T50 on the net. So, the jury will be out until the day these two fighters actually go head to head.
Understand this basic fact, average idiot.